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At least 115 people have been killed after heavy flooding submerged the market town of Mokwa in Nigeria’s northcentral Niger State, destroying thousands of homes, according to an emergency services official, in a country beset by deadly storms every year.Head of the operations office in Minna, capital of Niger State, Husseini Isah, said on Friday that many people were still in peril as rescue efforts continue.

“We have so far recovered 115 bodies and more are expected to be recovered because the flood came from far distance and washed people into the River Niger. Downstream, bodies are still being recovered,” a Niger State Emergency Management Agency (SEMA) spokesman, Ibrahim Audu Husseini, told the AFP news agency. “So, the toll keeps rising.”Torrential rains battered Mokwa late on Wednesday and lasted for several hours, washing away dozens of homes, with many residents still missing. A dam collapse in a nearby town caused the situation to rapidly deteriorate.It is difficult to say how well-placed rescue efforts are to salvage people “because every rainy season we continue to see things like this,” said Al Jazeera’s Ahmed Idris, reporting from Abuja.

“Warnings have been put out by authorities for people exposed or communities living along river banks to move to higher ground, especially when the rains start to peak, but every year we continue to see more and more lives and property damaged because of rainfall,” said Idris.“In certain areas, proper drainage isn’t there … and most of these disasters take officials of emergency management agencies in various states by surprise even though there has been consistent flooding over the past three years,” said Idris. As a result, “a lot of people don’t believe it will be any different” this time around.

Mokwa is a key meeting and transit point for traders from the south and food growers in the north of the country.

In the town, Mohammed Tanko, 29, a civil servant, told reporters that he lost at least 15 people from the house he grew up in.Swedish appliance manufacturer Electrolux, which in September 2022 announced it would exit Russia completely, saw shipments of its products decline sharply throughout 2022, from about 1,600 tonnes in January to just 184 tonnes in September.

But by May 2023, shipments topped pre-war levels at some 2,000 tonnes, before again plunging sharply.Electrolux expressed surprise at customs records appearing to show its products continuing to flow into Russia, mainly from Chinese suppliers.

A company spokesperson said the data suggested that Electrolux-branded products were being made and exported by unaffiliated firms without permission.“According to our data, we had no product exports to Russia during 2023, and we have procedures in place to confirm those numbers,” the spokesperson told Al Jazeera.